TECHNICAL & BUSINESS

WRITING
GC-120
Lecture - 10

Lecture By:
Shakir Rasheed Khan Khattak

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WRITING GUIDES

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A Social Model of Writing

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 A Social Model of Writing
■ Models are useful tools for discussing complex concepts.
■ The model discussed in this Lecture considers the relationships among writers,
readers, and texts.
■ Although it can't fully predict the complexities of a specific writing situation, they can
help writers understand the general principles that shape those situations.
■ This model is based on three observations.
■ First, a text may serve as the only point of contact between a reader and writer,
particularly when writers are separated by time and distance. 
■ Second, texts cannot pass "meaning" transparently and perfectly from writer to reader.
Writers seldom write exactly what they mean and readers seldom interpret a writer's
words exactly as the writer intended. 
■ Third, the factors that affect the attempts of writers and readers to share an
understanding of a text include not only their respective purposes, influences, and
understanding of each other, but also the physical, social, cultural, and historical
contexts in which reading and writing take place.
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 A Social Model of Writing
■ This model of the writing situation is based on five key questions:
1. What is the Writer's Purpose?
2. What Influences Writers?
3. What is the Reader's Purpose?
4. What Influences the Reader?
5. What do Writers and Readers Know about Each Other?
6. What is the Context?

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 What is the Writer's Purpose?
■ Every writer has a purpose for writing.
– In fact, most writers have multiple purposes.
■ A student writing an essay for a class might want to accomplish
several things, including completing the particular assignment as
required, learning something new, improving writing skills,
convincing others to adopt a particular point of view about an issue,
and getting a good grade.
■ An employee working on a project status report for a business
might want to convey key information to his or her superiors, earn a
manager's approval, perform well enough to earn a promotion, and
gain valuable experience in project management.
– Among other factors, identifying a writer's purposes can help you
understand the writer's decisions about the content, structure, and
design of a document.
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 What Influences Writers?
■ Writers will be influenced by a number of factors as they compose a document.
■ Their interests (what they'd like to do) and their needs (what they must do) will affect their decision
about choosing a particular topic, the points they make in that document, and the evidence they use to
support their points.
■ Writers' values and beliefs will also influence their document.
■ Writers are likely to choose examples and evidence that reflects their particular perspective on a topic. 
■ They will also affect the way they relate to their readers -- whether they adopt a friendly tone, for
example.
– Writers' knowledge of a particular topic will also affect their work on a document.
■ Writer Knows about the Topic
■ Writer Don’t Know about the Topic
■ Writers--and the writing situations in which they find themselves--are seldom free
of requirements and limitations. 
■ Requirements are typically associated with an academic or workplace assignment.
– Common requirements include: length (in words or pages), due date, number and/or type of sources
that can be used, organization and format (such as whether to include a title page, works cited list,
and so on), documentation style (such as MLA or APA), and intermediate drafts. 
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 What Influences Writers?
■ Common requirements include: length (in words or pages), due date, number
and/or type of sources that can be used, organization and format (such as
whether to include a title page, works cited list, and so on), documentation
style (such as MLA or APA), and intermediate drafts.
– MLA (Modern Language Association) format is used for humanities and
literature works.
– APA (American Psychological Association) is used for technical and
scientific works.
■ In contrast to requirements and limitations, opportunities expand the
possibilities for a writer.
■ Among many other possibilities, opportunities include access to a specialized
or particularly good library, personal experience with and knowledge about a
topic, access to people who are experts on a particular topic, and access to
hardware or software that can help you produce your document (such as
desktop publishing software, a good color printer, and Web development
software). 8
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 WRITING GUIDES
Technical Writers In The
World Of Content
Marketing
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 Online Content
■ Technical writers create content day in day out.
■ Whether it is a web help document, a project plan, an instruction manual,
or a video tutorial, it all falls under the definition of content.
■ It will not be wrong to say that in today’s digital age, content is what helps
businesses and individuals claim a respectable spot in the market.
– However, to claim and retain this spot, to gain attraction, generate
traffic, and help the audience, information must first be findable.
– Given the amount of content being generated on a daily basis, a single
document or webpage can easily get lost in the online world. 
■ This is where all content creators, including technical writers,
need to think about the marketing perspective.

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 Online Content
■ The differences
– Clearly, there are a number of differences between technical writing and content marketing. Some of the
major ones are as follows.
■ Technical writing is user-centered while content marketing is customer-centered.
– This means that, in most cases, technical writers create content for existing users while content
marketers focus more on the potential users.
■ Technical writers treat the audience as users first and customers later.
– The approach is the opposite for content marketers.
■ The purpose of technical writing is to instruct or direct users and help them succeed in their tasks.
■ The purpose of content marketing is to convince the audience to make a purchase, generating profit
as a result.
■ Some examples of technical writing include:
1. Instruction manuals
2. Policy manuals
3. Process manuals
4. User manuals
5. Reports of analysis
6. Instructions for assembling a product
7. A summarization of a long report that highlights and shortens the most important elements 12